Fushigi Yuugi: Behind the Kitchen Doors
by Little Cup of Sweet Tea
Summary: Just when Kio thought her life was crazy enough, having to serve a narcissistic emperor AND that brat, Corine, in the harem, she gets a new job, serving the priestess. Pretty soon, Kio ends up having to serve all of the Suzaku Seven and her master's wife, Houki. She finds herself caught up in some scary situations, and even some that are just strange. Please enjoy and review.
1. Prologue

**Warning: This prologue is to explain the connection Kio has with the Suzaku Seven, it is not based on anything that actually happened in the anime. And to answer you're next question: No, I do not own Fushigi Yuugi. Comments are appreciated. **

I was six when my village was destroyed by the Kuto armies. A dozen men dressed in all black started killing everyone out of nowhere in the dead of night. No one saw them enter the village. A child younger than me managed to elude them long enough to get the word to spread across the entire village. But by the time the warning reached the guards, the child was dead along with everyone else in the village. It wasn't long before nearby villages fell to the same fate.

I was the only person to survive their furry, and the only one who could warn the new emperor, Saihite, about the attacks. I rode my horse, Ky, as fast as I could to the capital of K onan. I knew full well that the palace was the most secure facility in the country, but I would just have to work my way around its security.

I reached the palace about midday that day. I could tell right away the guards were going to be a big problem, but I didn't make it all the way here just to fail. I swung the reigns to wrap it around a low tree branch close to the palace gate, leaped off of Ky and landed behind the guards. I didn't have time to admire my jump; I had to get to the throne room before any of the guards could stop me. I ran as fast as I could down the walkway to a giant pair of double doors, which I really hoped would be the right room. As it turns out, I did have the right room, but, to be honest, I was so out of breath that I could barely talk.

"Kuto armies!" I managed, "In Konan!... Many villages… destroyed!"

Now let's get one thing straight: I only knew three things about the new emperor. First, He was fourteen years old. Second: he was very fond of himself. And third: he had to do something to help me if he still wanted to be emperor come nightfall, and he was going to help me if I had to anonymously black mail him to do it.

I had his attention, but I didn't have time to say more because just then some very apologetic guards came into the throne room to arrest me. They would have too if it wasn't for the emperor.

"Wait!" He commanded the guards, then he looked at me and asked, "What do you mean 'Kuto armies in Konan'?"

"They attacked my village last night, your highness, they left none alive and it's nothing but ash now." I told him, "I saw several other villages that had suffered the same fate on the way here. It looked like they had only attacked the villages closest to the border."

"Send out soldiers to scout the damage!" he ordered the guards, "Get any survivors to safety and evacuate all remaining villages close to the border!"

"Yes, Sire!" They responded in unison.

"You girl!" He said, addressing me, "What is your name?"

"Kio." I told him, "I'm really sorry if I interrupted something important…"

"Not at all," he said, "This has actually been the highlight of my week. How old are you?"

"Six." I answered.

This seemed to stir up more questions than it did answers for the next thing he asked me was, "How did you get past the guards?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you…" I told him to avoid explaining how I literally jumped the guards.

He opened his mouth as if to contradict me and ask me to tell him anyway but then he closed it again and sighed saying, "You're probably right about that. I'm so sorry; do you have anywhere you can go, anyone you can stay with for now?"

I thought about it for a moment and couldn't think of anyone that I knew outside of the village.

"No…" I answered.

"Well then, Kio," He said, "You can stay here in the palace until we can find some other arrangement that will work for you."

I didn't know what to say, but I guess what really came out of my mouth was, "I- Ugh- Thank you!"

"It's the least I can do after the information you were able to give me." He told me.

I ended up staying indefinitely as a servant of his royal highness, and ended up becoming close friends with him after a while. The system worked: I made sure the palace was running smoothly, and he paid me in food. In other words, he couldn't find any place for me to go, so he made me his personal assistant. I was always busy with something or another but my free time was spent in the stables grooming Ky and in the nearby woods where I practiced my archery. I guess I was ok at it; I wasn't perfect by any means. I got to be on a first name basis with his highness, or a nickname basis anyway. Many people in the court called him Hotohori after the Chinese symbol on his neck.

That was my life at the palace for the next four years. Then, three weeks after Hotohori's eighteenth birthday, the Priestess of Suzaku appeared, and my life would never be the same again.


	2. Where it All Began

**I loosely based all of this fanfiction off of the events that occur in the English dub of the anime. I do not own Fushigi Yuugi and am in no way profiting (unless you count entertaining people as profiting) from this story. Enjoy!**

The morning everything changed, Hotohori was supposed to go on a tour of town. I had a bad felling about… well… just about everything that supposed to happen that day.

To me, this was nothing new; I was always getting that feeling when bringing her royal bitchiness, Kang-Lin, breakfast.

"Hurry up, will you?!" She demanded.

I moved slower.

"I'm going to report you to his highness!"

To this I only smirked.

She slapped me for this response, "You little piece of shit! I ought to have you fired!"

"That's not up to you…" I replied calmly as I walked out of the room.

My next stop that morning was the room of lady Houki. I had a much higher opinion of her.

When I walked in, she was still asleep. I smiled and shook her softly. She replied by waking with a yawn.

"You overslept!" I giggled.

She smiled at me for a moment before frowning and tracing the bruise Kang-Lin had left, "She hit you again…"

I shrugged. I wasn't about to complain about how much it had hurt. Kang-Lin had a strong arm I'd give her that.

Houki smiled at me, "Won't you join me for breakfast?"

I smiled and nodded softly. I wasn't about to admit it, but I'd overslept myself so I didn't have time to eat my own breakfast.

We had just finished eating when I heard commotion outside. Turned out his highness had been attacked. At least that's the story I was told.


	3. The Priestess

**Warning: This is based on the English dub of the Fushigi Yuugi anime not the manga. And to answer your next question: no, I do not own Fushigi Yuugi. Comments are appreciated. **

I was just about to go to the stables to feed the horses when Hotohori returned from visiting the village, and had a few prisoners coming in not far behind him. There were two of them: An oddly dressed, red-haired girl and a boy with a strange symbol on his forehead. Hotohori wasn't one to arrest people without a really good reason so I had to wonder what their offense was. According to the guards, the girl had attempted to assault Hotohori, and the boy was her accomplice.

Something told me there was more to this story. Hotohori himself was fascinated with the girl's origins. It was honestly the only thing keeping the pair of criminals alive.

With the prisoners safely locked away in the jail cells under the palace, I went down to the stables to feed the horses. Unfortunately that's when things really started going nuts.

The stable doors burst open and my friend and fellow servant, Isa, came running in and panting, "Prisoners!... Gone!... No idea!... Where they are!..."

"Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!" I stopped her, "Take a breath and start talking in complete sentences."

"The prisoners escaped!" She said, "They're somewhere about the palace grounds!"

"What!?" I cried, "What are those dumb guards doing?! Sleeping on the job?!"

"I don't know." She answered, "But all the servants are being asked to help search for them!"

"Ugh!" I exclaimed, "Why do _we_ have to help?! I mean really! Can't the guards handle it? These horses really need to be fed and besides, someone should stay here in case they try and escape on horseback."

"Really?" She asked me, "That's your excuse for not helping?"

"Maybe…" I answered her.

She rolled her eyes and said, "You do know that's just going to get you in more trouble than it's worth, right?"

"Probably," I shrugged, "Then again, Hotohori likes me so I could probably tell him that I didn't know we were supposed to help look for them and he'd believe me."

"You're willing to risk your job on that?" She asked

"Pretty much"

She rolled her eyes again, "Whatever, just make sure they don't steal any horses."

She left the stables leaving me alone with Ky. I pulled his brush out of the water bucket and started washing him. Staring into the water bucket I could see my reflection: black eyes and long brown hair. I guess I wasn't exactly princess good-looking but around here no one seemed to care.

I was just about finished washing him when I heard Hotohori laughing outside.

"Are you alright?" I heard him ask, "It appears as if you could be lost there's a gate in that direction you could find your way out through there."

"Um… Thank you!" I heard someone say.

I opened the door just a crack to get a look at what exactly was going on outside. One look confirmed my suspicions of who Hotohori was talking to: the girl I saw being taken to the dungeons earlier, odd though, I didn't see the boy she was with. I didn't understand what Hotohori was doing with the criminal either, but then again I rarely understood anything Hotohori did. I usually just blew it off as boredom.

"Tell me, are you the one they arrested earlier?" He asked, which was only to be followed by a silence as the girl stopped running at these words, and then he continued by saying, "It seems I have guessed right. They say you tried to tackle the Emperor's palanquin."

"Ah ha ha!" the girl laughed, "I don't know what you're talking about! I'm just out for a stroll and passing by!"

"Don't worry I'm on your side!" He called after her, "I'm not going to summon the guards believe me. You have my word of honor."

The girl relaxed a little and told him about how she got distracted by the smell of cooking foods and got separated from the boy she was with. She said she needed to find him quickly before the guards did.

_Shouldn't be too hard, _I thought, _those guards are hopeless._

"You want to find your friend?" Hotohori asked.

"You see," She said, "It's my fault he's involved in all of this. Even if I found a way, I wouldn't go back to my own world until I knew he was free."

"Your own world?" Hotohori asked in fascination, "You mean that you don't live in this realm? That you're from some other world entirely?"

"Uh-huh" She answered.

Then she seemed worried, as if she'd said too much.

"Fascinating!" Hotohori said, "Oh that's great! So you're from another world, huh? I want you to tell me everything about it!"

Ok I know what you're thinking: I should've snuck out the other side of the stable door and found the closest guard and dragged them over here to arrest her by now, but if the emperor wasn't worried why should I have been?

Naturally that's when Hotohori had to make things awkward for the poor girl. Honestly, I don't know what's more surprising: that the man's still single or that he hasn't mysteriously vanished off the face of the planet.

He held the girl's face in his hands and told her, "Do not worry, please. My name is Hotohori, though I'm not always called that."

"My name's Miaka Yukki, or just Miaka." The girl said in response.

I had to raise an eyebrow at this. I suddenly realized just why his highness was so interested in this girl.

For a moment I thought he was crazy for assuming such a thing. He believed this girl might be the priestess we'd been looking for. For the moment, I wasn't convinced.


End file.
